


End is forever

by wildmachinery



Series: apres-vie [1]
Category: due South
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-12-07
Updated: 2003-12-07
Packaged: 2017-10-16 04:22:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/168362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wildmachinery/pseuds/wildmachinery
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ray's just not sure who he is without him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	End is forever

He hears Dewey yelling into the radio. "Officer down! We need a bus, _now_ , Orbach and Lake!"

 _Officer down._ He can feel the beat of Fraser's heart in the slick rhythmic outrush of blood between his fingers. _Officer down._ He didn't think people could _have_ this much blood. Too much, way, way too much. _Officer down._ It's slippery as all hell, the dark wet stains on his uniform getting bigger all the time.

"Fraser? Fraser!" He's yelling now. "Look at me, Fraser, this ain't buddies, what you're doing here. Just look at me. Look at me." Slow, dark flutter of lashes against his cheeks, and he's looking up at Ray like he's drugged, underwater, and he's smiling. Ray swears. "What the hell are you grinning about?! C'mon, tell me what's so fucking funny, you stupid-" He bites down hard on his lip to keep his eyes clear. "Dammit, talk to me. Say something. I can never get you to shut up and now you won't talk to me? Don't close your eyes now, Fraser. Fraser, look at me, talk to me, say something. Open your eyes. Fraser!" He's not breathing. He's still smiling. "Dewey! Where's the fucking ambulance?!" Fraser's not breathing and Ray can't stop crying and all that blood is soaking straight through his shirt, soaking him to the skin, and Fraser's still smiling. The EMTs are shoving him out of the way, and he doesn't want to let go but Huey practically picks him up and leads him away, and one of the guys working on Fraser is shaking his head, and Huey wraps his arms around him to keep him from jumping the morons. "It's ok, Ray." His face is mashed into Huey's coat, and Huey's squeezing the breath out of him to keep him from fighting, and he can't stop crying. "It's going to be ok. Calm down." He wants to hit something, bad, and the med guys are slowing down, backing off, and that can't be good. "It's ok." It can't be good.

"It's going to be ok, Ray."

Next thing he knows, Huey's got a cut opening up on his cheek and Dewey's holding Ray's arms behind his back. He's raging. _How the fuck is it going to be ok_ , he wants to say, scream, but his knees buckle and Dewey catches him before he falls to the pavement. When he looks back over, Fraser's lying there alone. There's so much blood.

It can't be good.

  


* * *

It doesn't rain at the funeral. Ray can't help feeling that the good weather is disrespectful, somehow, but the blue skies do bring out those Mountie dress uniforms to perfection. They're a lot of little red blurs in the corners of his vision, and they flash around back and forth until Ray thinks he's going to go nuts. It's all so damned impressive, and he sits there and glowers through the eulogy, the seven-gun salute, and the bagpipes, and he thinks.

His brain's been sort of sluggish ever since that night, and he doesn't remember much of what happened. Probably just doesn't want to remember. He feels ... rudderless, now. Set adrift. Lost, like he'd talked about with Fraser up north, chasing Muldoon. You can always look to the stars, Fraser'd said, to find your location. Ray'd just looked to Fraser.

It's not something he can quantify. It's not just missing the guy, even though he does, something terrible.

He can't really quite figure what it is.

  


* * *

When it's all over, Frobisher hunts him down and gives him a round-trip ticket to Yellowknife, courtesy of the Government of Canada; some story about himself and Fraser's dad jumping into each other across a gorge, which seems way too much like one of Fraser's metaphorical Inuit stories for Ray's liking; a copy of Fraser's will; and the urn containing Fraser's ashes.

Ray takes the little jar and tries not to think of the contents as Fraser. He reads the will and found out that Fraser'd wanted his remains to be scattered in the Nahanni River. He thinks about Frobisher's story on the plane, and thinks it's making a little more sense, but he still can't figure out why Fraser had picked the Nahanni River, of all places, to be ... interred. Ray stops thinking then, flags down the stewardess, and orders a double scotch, straight up.

From Yellowknife, he rents a car and drives for a few days to Fort Providence. You can only get to the Nahanni by boat or by plane, but Frobisher's made all the arrangements for him, so all Ray has to do is find this guy Pierson and his seaplane-for-rent. Pierson isn't much of a talker, but that suits Ray fine. He's gotten pretty used to not talking, himself.

They make a stop at Nahanni Butte for supplies, then Pierson drops Ray off at Virginia Falls and tells him he'll be back in two days. From there, Ray hikes upstream for a few hours, until he finds a place that feels right to him. The whole place is quiet - the ranger at the warden station had mentioned that it's not the right season for tourists - but this spot's got a quiet that feels almost sacred to Ray. Church-quiet, almost, but the rushing of the river makes it peaceful instead of uncomfortable. Maybe Fraser'd found this place, too, and his choice of burial grounds is starting to make a little more sense.

The little metal jar's been a weight on him that he can feel, slowing his steps, and it's almost a relief when he takes it out of his pack. The riverbank is wide, but slippery, and when he gets to the water's edge, he unscrews the top of the jar and can't think of what to say. All the trite stuff - hope you've gone on to a better place, we'll miss you, you were such a good friend; it's all in the past tense, and it all sticks in his throat, because he can _see_ Fraser raising his eyebrow in that sarcastic way he's got and pointedly not saying anything about how ridiculous it is, and Ray's suddenly so angry he can't breathe. His hands are shaking, holding the jar, and it suddenly hits him that it's Fraser in there, but that doesn't make sense because he can still see Fraser, standing right there in jeans and a leather jacket, and he's going insane because now he can hear Fraser, too, and Ray loses his footing in the slippery mud and falls with a splash into the ice-cold water of the Nahanni River.

He curses a blue streak as he clambers out, wet and shivering, and realizes that he's lost his hold on the jar. It's out of his reach, floating downstream, and he looks after it in an attempt to not look at the Fraser who isn't actually there. Fraser's saying Ray's name over and over, which is something that always used to drive Ray batty, but he resists the urge to stick his fingers in his ears by telling himself that since it's all in his head, there's no way he'd be able to block it out that easily.

It's kind of hard to not look at somebody when they're standing right in front of you, though. "Ray?"

Ray stares down at imaginary Fraser's imaginary hiking boots, and says, "Mmf?"

"Ray, are you all right?"

Even when he's a hallucination, the guy's polite. What a surprise. "No, I don't think so." Ray can feel an attack of hysterical laughter burbling up inside, so he keeps staring at Fraser's not-really-there boots and swallows hard. "I think I'm going crazy, actually. Which you should know, since you're actually me and I'm just standing here talking to myself. It's probably some sort of split personality type thing ..." Something horrible occurs to him. "Oh, god. This means I'm half Canadian, doesn't it?" He giggles. "I wonder if I could get dual citizenship out of this ..."

"Ray. Ray. Look at me." Ray shakes his head mutely. Not-really-Fraser sighs. "Ray, you're not crazy. Well," he amends, "no crazier than before, anyway. I admit I'm not the best person to consult regarding mental health, but you've always seemed to be relatively stable."

Ray's got a sinking feeling in his stomach. "No, no, I'm crazy. Really. Like a cockroach." He just _knows_ that not-Fraser is about to correct him ( _Bedbug, Ray_ ), and he forges on, a little desperately. "'Cause you're not really here. You're dead and floating down that river there." He waves his arm vaguely in the direction of the Nahanni.

The visual manifestation of Ray's psychotic break clears its non-existent throat. "Well, yes, I am dead ... and, physically speaking, floating down the river, and I'm sorry I startled you, Ray."

Ray nods and mutters an "'S'ok" before he can stop himself. He bites his lip and keeps his eyes on the imaginary boots.

"However, I am also here. Really here. It's a sort of apres-vie experience, I believe, and I have a feeling it runs in my family ..."

"Oh _god_ , it _is_ you," Ray moans. "I don't even know what that _means_."

"Now, that's just not true, Ray," ghost-Fraser murmurs disapprovingly. "You know exactly what that means."

"Christ."

"Blasphemy, Ray."

"Shut _up_." He buries his head in his hands. This can't possibly be real, but when he looks up, Fraser's worried eyes are so blue it makes Ray's throat tighten with something akin to despair. "So ... why?"

Fraser's eyebrows draw together in confusion. "Why what, Ray?"

It's just cruel, Ray thinks, how he feels more sure of himself after going insane. Maybe Stella was right, and he is too needy and dependent, but he's never needed anybody more than he needs Fraser. Ray's just not sure who he is without him.

So maybe he is crazy. "Why are you here?" Maybe he's just lucky. "What is it, unfinished business or something?"

He wants to be lucky.

"Well, in a sense ..." Fraser rubs at his eyebrow uncomfortably, then shoves his hands in his pockets and looks straight at Ray. "You, Ray." _He wants to be lucky._ "I came back for you."

What the hell, Ray thinks. Embrace the crazy.

Ray lets out his breath in a short, sharp sigh. "Great." He grins. "Greatness." He watches the little wrinkle between Fraser's eyes disappear, and thinks that sanity might just be overrated.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted at [ds_flashfiction](http://community.livejournal.com/ds_flashfiction/188502.html).


End file.
